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Communities across the country have used the Center for Neighborhood Technology's (CNT) Housing + Transportation (H+T)® Affordability Index to more fully grasp and act on the relationship between development patterns, transportation behavior and household transportation costs.
This training and discussion explored how to effectively use the H+T Affordability Index for performance measures and in support of regional transportation planning under MAP-21. The training was held Sept. 30 in New Orleans, LA, by the Center for Planning Excellence and the Louisiana Public Health Institute and made available via webinar.
The two main goals of this session:
To demonstrate how H+T Affordability data and metrics may be used in the development of performance measures for regional transportation plans; and
To explore how MPOs and state DOTs might make effective use of H+T data and metrics for walkability, transit access, employment…

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This video is from the August 14 webinar.
Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) are critical sustainability partners and play an important role in planning and programming federal and state transportation funds. Current federal surface transportation legislation, referred to as MAP-21, includes several provisions that allow regions to advance sustainability projects such as transit-oriented development (TOD), bicycling and pedestrian trails, joint development, placemaking, and complete street policies, among other investments. This webinar explores provisions within federal transportation funding that regions can use now to begin implementing their sustainability plans. The mysteries behind acronyms such as CMAQ, STPP, TIP and TAP are revealed, including how these can each be used to support sustainability investments. Examples of MPOs utilizing the authority and flexibility within were shared, together with examples of how state and local funding are also being tapped to…

Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) has been embraced around the country as a means to achieve sustainability goals, including reduced auto dependency and traffic congestion, as well as improved economic competitiveness. However, the process of actually implementing TOD varies based on a variety of physical, economic, and market conditions.

Editor's Note: Transit ridership is growing and communities across the nation have been responding with new transit systems and major expansions, with mayors often leading the way. But as this week's excerpt from Are We There Yet? illustrates, and recent updates to the Transit Space Race underline, federal funding is falling further behind what is necessary.
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Interest in transit has boomed during the past two decades, and transit ridership is up 13 percent since 2000. The American Public Transportation Association, in its 2011 analysis of transit use, found that “Americans took 10.4 billion trips on public transportation in 2011, the second highest annual ridership since 1957. Only ridership in 2008, when gas rose to more than $4 a gallon, surpassed last year’s ridership.”
Regions across the country are responding by building new…

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Some places just don’t have the density of jobs and residents and intensity of activity that justifies an investment in rail transit. Many of these communities are investing in bus and shuttle service as well as in programs that make it easier and more pleasant to carpool, walk and bike to jobs in an urban or suburban downtown, and to get healthier while doing it. Des Moines, for example, which has a population 400,000, has been investing nearly $2 million a year to make the downtown more walkable and create a network of bike lanes and trails.
Google — which offers job perks that are the envy of Silicon Valley, including chef-prepared food at all hours — is trying to make commutes as painless as possible by ferrying its pampered workers on shuttles that run on biodiesel, with leather seats, wi-fi, and even room for dogs. The Google shuttle carries a quarter of the company’s…

The Federal Transit Administration will hold three public webinars to discuss the New Starts final rule published on Jan. 9 in the Federal Register and the accompanying proposed policy guidance, available on the website here. Comments on the proposed guidance are due March 11.

Reconnecting America today released an updated interactive map showing all of the fixed-guideway transit projects in the United States. You can read more about the project in this Reconnecting America News report or you can go directly to the map here.

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The Denver Broncos and a resurgent Payton Manning take on a Chargers team Monday night. These division rivals have no love lost and will seek to keep each other further away from the post season with a win today.
In the realm of complete communities, unlike on the gridiron, San Diego and Denver compete in different divisions. San Diego competes with the heavyweights, with just over 3 million residents, while Denver falls in the middle division, where regions between 3 million and 500,000 population compete. That in part may explain why Denver brings home straight “A’s” in Living, Moving, Working, and Thriving, while San Diego has three “Cs” and a “B.” Denver’s competition isn’t generally as fierce as San Diego faces in the top tier.
In many cases, San Diego does a better job on individual metrics than Denver. San Diego has a higher share of households who live near…

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The Half-Mile Circles blog is a place to share information about recent research, innovations and other issues related to TOD and livable communities. We also invite experts to talk about their work. Combined with Jeff Wood's The Other Side of the Tracks, the Half-Mile Circles blog is an opportunity for a daily dose of TOD, and allows you to weigh in with your own opinions. Usual blog rules apply; please keep the comment threads civil. To submit an expert article, contact Jeff Wood